NYU Social Venture Winners

9:47 pm | NYU, Sustainability | No comment

Water Canary, a venture that was set up by a team of NYU business students and scientists that have developed a low cost water testing device for use in disaster relief received the prize money of $25,000 for the social venture competition.

America Smiles on the other hand, is a venture too that was set up by a team from the NYU College of Dentistry that aims to bring oral health care to millions of Americans who do not have adequate access to dental care received the price money of $75,000 from the same competition.  

Based on the strengths of this year’s finalists, the judges had a great difficulty in choosing just one winner so they decided to choose two winners instead of one.

Students invent portable water treatment

6:11 pm | Oak Ridge High School, Sustainability | No comment

“Controlled chaos” every Tuesday at Oak Ridge High School in the physics class of Peggy Bertrand, engineer George Solomon said.

This is when the students group themselves equipped with devices and lab kits spread out around the classroom. Scholars worked on projects varying from an erupting geyser to a unique way to make water potable.

Environmental engineer, Tim Myrick, said that the portable water treatment system now is making noise since it is significant and can be applied to isolated places to produce clean water.

Chuck Agle, left, an engineer who volunteers as a mentor in Peggy Bertrand’s Oak Ridge High School physics class, helps students Hanneke Weitering, center, and Greg Lyon as they work on a generator for a portable water treatment system.

Students will visit a creek next month to test the current of the water wheel they have invented. The spinning wheel will turn a turbine to bring a generator to power an ultraviolet light to cure the water.

In honor of the school’s mascot, the students named their invention “Wildcat Water Purifier”.

Peggy Bertrand and her charges will go to Cambridge, Mass., in late June after pulling the project together to present it at EurekaFest, an event at MIT.